The NCAA tournament selection committee has been vilified here and elsewhere in past years. But under extraordinary and difficult circumstances this week, it executed masterfully.

To account for the Southeastern Conference tournament’s tornado-related issues and the potentially bracket-busting games today involving Georgia and Illinois, the committee prepared eight different brackets.

I can’t vouch for the seven in the trash can, but the one it produced at 3 p.m. Sunday was pretty good.

You can quibble with some decisions, but there’s nothing close to egregious.

Clearly, the NCAA’s decision to stock its most prestigious committee with basketball minds, as opposed to career administrators, is having the desired effect.

It performed well last year under Princeton athletic director Gary Walters, who played for and coached under Pete Carril, and was even better this season under George Mason’s Tom O’Connor, a former coach (and Santa Clara athletic director).

Beyond the committee itself, the biggest winner on Selection Sunday was UCLA.

As the top seed in the West, UCLA has the easiest path to the Final Four of any No. 1, and it’s not even close. Duke, Xavier, Connecticut, Drake, Purdue, Brigham Young, Texas A&M – those teams have no chance to beat the Bruins in Anaheim or Phoenix.

Call it a makeup move by the committee. The Bruins were No. 2 in the West last year when they should have been atop the region – and they proved it by thumping No. 1 Kansas in the Elite Eight.

Other Selection Sunday winners and losers . . .

Winner: Stanford. The Cardinal gets the Big Red (Cornell) in Anaheim, which is nothing like drawing the Cardinals (Louisville) in Lexington.

Loser: Stanford. Slotted to face No. 2 seed Texas in the Sweet 16 in Houston, which is like drawing Louisville in Lexington. (Stanford would have been better off with Duke as the No. 2 in its region.)

Winner: West Coast Conference. A record three bids, and judging by their seeds, the at-large teams (No. 7 Gonzaga and No. 10 St. Mary’s) weren’t even on the bubble.

(Biggest) Loser: Tennessee. The Vols beat Xavier, Gonzaga, USC and Memphis (at Memphis), cruised through the SEC regular season and had the No. 1 strength of schedule. And yet they’re a No. 2 in North Carolina’s bracket with Louisville looming in the Sweet 16? Yikes.

Loser: North Carolina. The No. 1 overall seed got the toughest bracket, with a terrific No. 2 (Tennessee) and perhaps the best No. 3 (Louisville). Call it the anti-UCLA path to San Antonio.

Winner: Duke. Speaking of . . . The Blue Devils probably should have been a No. 3 – shocking that they’d get the benefit of the doubt! If Duke meets No. 10 Arizona in the second round, we might see 10 guards on the court at once.

Loser: Arizona State. Swept Arizona, pounded Xavier, finished tied for fifth in a hellacious conference. But that non-conference strength of schedule (300-something) and upsets in other leagues ultimately doomed the Devils.

Winner: Baylor. Five years after Patrick Dennehy’s death, the Bears’ reclamation project reached the Big Dance. Despite losing eight of its last 13 games, Baylor sneaks in with an 11 seed.

Loser: Pac-10. The conference ended up with six bids, not seven. Did the officials keep Arizona State out of the Dance with that awful call at the end of the USC game? Probably not, but it’s worth wondering.

Winner: Washington State. The Cougars lost seven conference games and were 0-5 against Stanford and UCLA, yet they claimed a No. 4 seed – maybe two lines too high.

Loser: Billy Packer. After all these years, he still doesn’t get it: Harping on conference bids/RPIs when he should know that the committee does not discuss conference affiliation.

Winner: Atlantic 10. When the week started, the A-10 was looking at one bid (Xavier). Then the Musketeers fell, Temple rose and the committee looked favorably on St. Joe’s. End result: three bids.

Loser: Butler. Had 10 wins against RPI top-100 teams and should have been a No. 5 seed. Instead, the Bulldogs dropped to a No. 7 – no love for the mid-majors.

Winner: Big East. Snares eight bids thanks to the committee tapping Villanova for one of the final at-large spots – arguably its biggest mistake.

Jon Wilner has been covering college sports for decades and is an AP top-25 football and basketball voter as well as a Heisman Trophy voter. He was named Beat Writer of the Year in 2013 by the Football Writers Association of America for his coverage of the Pac-12, won first place for feature writing in 2016 in the Associated Press Sports Editors writing contest and is a five-time APSE honoree.